Child's Play: A Spaceman's Story

by Guerin Zand

“See, that’s your problem Milly. Does it really matter if it works? The fun part is trying and if it works great. If not? It can’t hurt. You really just need to learn to have some fun. Want to join me?” And she did.

  I forgot how many points it was worth to get the alien hotty in bed. I would have to work out a fair scoring system at some point. That way the next human male who gets abducted has something to shoot for. Yes, we men do keep score!

  Milly laid her head next to mine and grabbed my hand.

  I wondered if holding hands was required for the whole transit-portal thing since she had been holding my hand last time. Maybe if she didn’t hold my hand I would be left behind in the dead of space, which would not be a good thing. I held her hand tightly just in case.

  “Are you still upset with me over this morning Guerin?”

  “Of course I am Milly. A man never lets a woman off the hook. It’s just the nature of our relationships. Women do the same.”

  “Half the fun in relationships is making up after a fight. You always remember what caused the fight because the next time you fight you can bring it up and throw it in their face again. That can turn it into an even bigger fight and then making up is even better.”

  “I’m sorry Guerin, but that sounds a bit silly. I was hoping you would forgive me.”

  “Milly, you’re not really listening. I forgive you. That’s not the issue. I just reserve the right to use it against you in the future, if needed. You really should spend more time studying the beings you abduct.”

  We both laughed.

  She then rolled over and kissed me. That’s right first base. I really should have been keeping a record of all this so I could track my progress a little better.

  “Aren’t you supposed to kiss me back Guerin? I was, I don’t know, expecting more?”

  “Kissed a lot of Earth men in the past Milly?”

  “More than you, I suspect.” She said with a nice smile.

  “Well Milly, there really aren’t any set rules on these sorts of things. You just have to, go with it, and frankly you kinda surprised me. I mean, I wasn’t ready.”

  So I rolled back in her direction and planted my lips firmly over hers. I started to slip her a bit of the old tongue and then it happened. NOTHING and EVERYTHING!

  Ok, kissing a girl while traveling through a transit portal helps. Really. A kiss never lasts long enough and even though in the void it lasted forever it still wasn’t long enough. I’d found the cure for portal lag. I was going to be famous.

  My lips and tongue were just where I left them. I barely noticed anything happened, except the longest and best kiss of my ENTIRE LIFE! I opened my eyes and finished the kiss. Milly’s eyes were still closed.

  How could she resist me now?

  Milly was smiling as she opened her eyes. “How do you feel Guerin?”

  I just smiled. I think she got the message.

  “See. I told you it wouldn’t be as bad the next time.”

  I am not sure she really got why that was the case. I was going to have to explain it I guess. This is a common problem I’ve had with Earth women as well. Go figure.

  “Milly, I didn’t even really notice it. I was sort of pre-occupied with something else. You might have noticed that since it was you I was pre-occupied with. You didn’t enjoy that?”

  Changing the subject Milly looked at the towel on the pillow. “See it didn’t work.”

  She seemed very proud of that fact. I figured out smarting an Earth monkey was a big accomplishment among her peers. I wasn’t going to ruin it for her.

  “Maybe I just did it wrong?” I gave Milly my best befuddled monkey boy look. “I think we’re supposed to use separate towels. That could have been the problem. We’re just going to have to try again the next time we get a chance.”

  I had the biggest smile ever on my silly little face.

  Milly just smiled back as she got up out of the bed.

  I’m not complaining. The kiss was enough for now.

  I was really happy. This whole space travel thing was starting to get on track. Of course, I could still be in some padded room tossing my feces at the door but I didn’t care anymore. I liked this new reality and I was going to commit to it.

  “Come on Guerin. We have a few hours before we dock with the mother ship”, she was smiling too. “You might want to take a shower and get ready. I think you’ll like what you’re about to see.”

  She brought up the viewer to show me the outside view of the mother ship and our little shuttle. Our shuttle was really small compared to the mother ship. That thing had to be as big as Texas.

  Ok, maybe it wasn’t that big. You know how men are at estimating the size of things.

  Our ship was hidden by the “You are here” dot at this scale. There was a giant gas nebula in the background, if I remember my astronomy correctly. I was simply in awe. I may have even been drooling. Milly seemed to be enjoying my reaction.

  “I’m going to go take a shower myself. I’ll come and get you in about an hour before we dock.”

  I didn’t want this time with Milly to end so I finally spoke up.

  “We could shower together. It would save water and I’m sure conservation is something you space aliens probably take seriously.”

  Now you might think that was lame but I have scored a few tree huggers in my day using that same line.

  “We could, but we’d probably actually use more water than we needed and you know that. Nice try though. You’re doing much better.” And she gave me that bad girl smile again and walked out.

  I felt that old condition starting to pop up again so a shower probably was a good idea. Let the little alien space pervs on this ship have one last jolly. I didn’t care anymore. I entered the shower, looked up and shouted, “THIS ONE’S FOR YOU JULIE!”

  Chapter 8

  A Little Alone Time with Julie

  I had finished my shower and was playing with the viewer so I could see more of this massive space ship we were approaching. It was kinda neat now that I had sort of figured out how to use this thing. You could zoom in and out and look at the ship from any angle. I really liked this viewer.

  The mother ship looked more like what we would call a space station. It sort of looked like a huge flying saucer, sorry to disappoint you, but it did. Looking at it from the side it had an elliptical shape with a top and bottom made of large clear dome like structures. In the center, there was an open area all around the ship where hundreds of shuttles like ours seemed to be either departing from or docking in. It was over five miles in total height at the center, based on the viewer’s info, and looking down from the top, not really sure you can say which is the top or bottom since we were in space after all, it had a circular profile from this vantage point almost 100 miles in diameter. It looked like two giant dome cities slapped together with a big space port in the middle.

  Now I assumed they had gravity there since our little dingy had gravity but I couldn’t help wondering how the gravity could be in one direction in the top domed city and another direction on the bottom domed city. Maybe the little space dock was a zero-g area? I really hoped so. I mean what kind of space adventure would it be without a little zero-g time?

  It appeared as we docked that we oriented what I thought of as the bottom of our ship to be parallel to the bottom of one of the domed cities. The whole up, down, top bottom thing was really confusing me now. I didn’t seem to have a problem with that on our shuttle. I just assumed down was where my feet were planted, right? I decided not to think about this too much and hoped the space aliens had this all figured out before I got there.

  There was a knock at my door and I just said, “Come in.” I was really looking forward to spending more time with Milly.

  “Look Milly. Your little pet seems to have figured out how to use the viewer for something other than watching porn.”

  Yes, Milly had brought Julie with her. My good mood seemed to slip out the open door.

  I was pretty sur
e that Julie was the underlying root of all my “space” problems. She seemed to me the sort of creature that enjoyed pulling the wings off flies just because she could and here I was.

  “Julie, I told you to stop calling him that. Can’t you just try and be nice to him for a little bit?”

  “It’s alright Milly. I’m not going to let Julie ruin this for me. This is way to cool for even her to spoil.”

  “Well that’s good Guerin because, well, you are going to have to spend some time alone with Julie in quarantine until we get permission to bring you aboard. As the medical doctor on board she is going to have to run a few more tests and wait for the results to get approved first. Then we can get you situated on the ship.”

  “It will be fun Guerin. You can play with your coloring books and if you’re a good little pet I’ll show you where I hide my lolly pops.”

  “I’m pretty sure I know where you hide your lolly pops Julie. I’ve dated women like you before.”

  “Good. Then we should have sooooo much fun together. I’ve been looking forward to this you know? A little alone time with you.”

  Julie was smiling. I don’t think it was good news for me.

  “I’m still not going to let you play with my ass so don’t get your hopes up space bitch!”

  Julie pouted and Milly shook her head. I think Milly knew that no good would come from this.

  “Both of you. Guerin! Julie! Behave! I don’t have time to for all this.”

  “Guerin, just try and keep calm, no matter what she says or does. Promise me you won’t try to kill her.”

  “Do I have to?”

  “Yes!”

  “Ok, I promise. Can I hurt her just a little? Maybe bitch slap her around a bit? She looks like she might enjoy that kinda thing.”

  “No!”

  “Julie. Don’t provoke him. I know how much you enjoy it but we don’t have time for your games right now.”

  “Well what am I going to do then?”

  “Your job. Remember that’s why we’re here?”

  “Ok. Let’s go monkey boy.”

  I started following Julie down the main hallway on the crew deck. We made our way to the closest elevator and I got in with her. I was just staring straight ahead. I figured it was best to just shut up and not give Julie any openings. When we got to the top deck she guided me through the cargo hold and out the open cargo bay. I had wondered how you got off one of these shuttles.

  She continued to lead me through a small hallway. I would have enjoyed looking around and asking some questions about everything around me, but I wasn’t going to ask Julie. I really wished Sammy was around.

  She opened a door on the right side and motioned me in to the room.

  “After you Julie.” That’s right I wasn’t turning my back on her.

  “Really Guerin? Do you really think I find your ass that interesting?”

  I gave her my nicest smile. Still I wasn’t going to let her bait me.

  “I’m just trying to be nice Julie. It’s what a gentleman would do. We open the door for a ‘lady’ and let her go first. I promised Milly I’d be nice to you. I’m just trying.”

  “Whatever.”

  I followed here in and she led me to a desk and told me to take a seat. I put my bag on the desk and sat down.

  “Would you like something to drink?”

  “No, I ‘m good but thanks anyways Julie.”

  “Well I have some things to take care of. I’ll be right here at this station if I you need anything. I guess you can read or listen to music. Just try and keep yourself busy and this shouldn’t take too long.”

  “Ok”

  “And try not to play with yourself. I know that appears to be your favorite past time but really I don’t need to see that.”

  Well that cease fire seemed to last a whole 5 minutes! I took a deep breath. It didn’t help.

  “Julie, I thought you liked watching me. Since we have this alone time together I thought I’d give you a private show if you asked nice.”

  “In your dreams monkey boy!”

  “Does this mean a blow job is out the question too?”

  “Just shut up and try to behave.”

  “Well I guess I could start searching for those lolly pops but I am pretty sure I know exactly where they are, so that’s not going to take too long. What am I going to do after that?”

  “Look Guerin you need to start taking things a little more seriously.”

  “Me Julie? I was being nice, and serious, until you had to make that little smartass remark about playing with myself.”

  “You can’t seem to cope with this reality and so you see what you want and interpret it in a way that makes you comfortable. You think we’re some sort of intergalactic slackers that have nothing more important to do then humiliate you?”

  “And you’re not?

  Julie continued to do whatever she was doing at that station.

  “For the life of me I don’t know why Milly had to choose you. I told her this wouldn’t work out. This is serious. You haven’t got a clue what’s going on here, do you?”

  “No Julie, I don’t. Maybe that’s because no one has bothered to tell me jack shit since you abducted me. Did you two ever think maybe if you just knocked on my door, asked to talk to me, explained things and then gave me a choice it might have been a better way to go about this? We Earth monkeys kinda find abduction to be, how can I say this so you might understand, RUDE!”

  “All I have been able to figure out is that Milly has some little project, what that means I have no clue, that she needs me for.”

  Julie stopped playing with her little consul and sat down next to me.

  “I can’t really explain why you’re here or what Milly’s project is. It’s a bit complicated and I doubt you could possibly understand. I hoped you would at least trust Milly when she tells you it’s important. Not just to her but the entire human race.”

  There it was. I held the future of humanity in my grasp. Really is anyone buying that. I wasn’t.

  “Did you actually hear what you just said Julie. I mean talk about stupid! If the entire human race is depending on me, then whoever is in charge of all this should be fired. Even you’d have to agree with me on that.”

  “Milly is the one in charge and yes I agree. You wouldn’t be my choice for anything! Let me try and explain what I can and try and help you make sense out of this.”

  “You know Milly has been watching you for quite some time but what you don’t realize is that she has been watching you even before you were born. She was there that day at the hospital acting as a nurse.”

  “Why would she do that. That makes no sense.”

  “You have to realize that what you call Milly’s ‘little’ project isn’t a little project at all. It spans centuries, millennia. The time table of this project does not revolve about you. Your life is based on a schedule that was worked out a long time ago.”

  “Oh, I got it. You need my brain to get the ULTIMATE QUESTION, right?”

  “God help me, not that Guide again. It’s just a book Guerin. We’re not going to cut out your brain in search of the true meaning of life.”

  “No Julie, you’re going to probe my ass to find it! Sure, the Guide may not be totally accurate but I am seeing some parallels here.”

  We actually both laughed at that one. Could we be bonding? I hope not. Every good space story needs a super space villain and I had chosen Julie for that part.

  “No, we’re not going to find the answer hidden in your ass either. Can I get back to being serious again?”

  “Sure. Continue on sweet cheeks.”

  “When you were in high school all busy with drugs, booze and trying to get into the pants of anything female, you were really flirting with death and you came pretty close a few times. Milly was worried about you and we had to go to Earth and try to prevent anything bad from happening. Remember some anonymous girl who would call your house late at night asking where you were?”<
br />
  “Yes. How did you know about that?”

  Just about every Friday and Saturday night, during my senior year in high school, my parents would get calls early in the morning from some girl who’d never leave her name. I always wondered who that was. I didn’t have a clue. Of course, my parents weren’t thrilled about the calls especially when they’d find I still wasn’t home. I caught a lot of hell because of those calls.

  “Well that was Milly. Mystery solved. She figured it would be a good way to get your parents involved and get you to settle down. “

  “Are you shittin me? This is starting to make less sense the more you explain it.”

  “I told you it wouldn’t be easy to understand.”

  “Milly has always been watching over you. She was always watching and she was always there when you needed her. I think she actually became a little obsessed with you.”

  “When you were in college she would sometimes drop down to see you at a bar or a party to check how you were doing and to just see you. Sometimes she would even talk with you but you probably don’t remember since you seemed to enjoy your drinking quite a bit in college.”

  “When your college girlfriend dumped you, ripped out your heart, ate it raw and shit it out in front of you, Milly went to Earth. I mean that girl had devastated you and Milly was worried you might do something stupid. She met you at the bar where you were at, trying to drink yourself to death, and talked to you, comforted you and got you home safely.”

  “All that stupid shit you pulled in your life but all Milly saw was the good stuff. One time you actually stood up for her and offered to protect her. I think that’s when she knew you were the one she needed.”

  “When was that? I can’t remember ever meeting Milly before, although, I thought when I met her the other day that she looked familiar. I figured she just had one of those faces that reminded me of someone else.”

  “You were working in Tampa and it was early summer. You were at a skydiving event some holiday week end and she was in your jump group. You were doing that stupid dance before jumping ...”

  “You mean dirt diving?”